The Hate Of His Life
by RZZMG
Summary: Draco Malfoy looks at his relationship with Hermione Granger over the last 7 years as his side and hers collide in battle. Maybe Dumbledore was right about love being at the heart of every decision. Canon, 7th Yr. Dramione/Draco x Hermione. COMPLETE!


**I took a few hours away from my other fics, because I was hitting a wall and needed time away, and came up with two one-shots. This is one of them. The challenge I set myself to get the creative juices flowing again was to see what I could pump out onto paper in only an hour. I hope it's enjoyable for you. Please review, if you have time and inclination!**

**SUMMARY:** Draco Malfoy looks at his relationship with Hermione Granger over the last seven years, and recounts what _really_ happened during and after the events at Malfoy Manor and The Battle of Hogwarts. Rated "T" for violent images of battle, language.

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**The Hate of His Life**

**By: RZZMG**

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He despised her the moment he first glimpsed her hideous, bushy pile of brown and auburn curls ambling towards him down the marble and stone hallway, Potter's ugly, scarred face bent down close to hers to hear something she'd said over the noise of the students rushing to and fro to get to their first morning class of the new year. The 'Dynamic Duo,' as he would later think of them, shared a laugh, and in that moment, Draco Malfoy knew _she'd_ be the hate of his life.

Her name, he'd found out later (because, really, Draco hadn't paid a whit of attention to the girl during the sorting ceremony, so focused was he on his new nemesis and the ginger-haired Weasley prat sitting with a dumb expression on his face next to him), was Hermione Granger and she was another one of those filthy, little Mudbloods that Dumbledore had pitifully taken in to further contaminate the school.

Much to his enjoyment, Draco spent the next few years tormenting the girl and her lame-arsed friends whenever the opportunity arose, enjoying making her squirm and spit in righteous fury. But when she'd dared to hit him at the end of third term, third year, he'd swore he'd make her pay someday for her disrespectful impertinence.

That summer, though, instead of seeking his much plotted revenge, Draco had found himself oddly warning Pothead to get Granger out of the way of the incoming Death Eaters at the Quidditch World Cup. And through the crowds of panicking bodies, he'd looked for her to make sure she had, in fact, been taken out of harm's way. He told himself afterwards, it was because no one got to pick on Hermione Granger except _him_, and his actions were simply a reassurance of her survival for the nasty, awful retribution he'd planned to inflict upon her one day.

When she'd walked into the Yule Ball on Viktor Krum's arm that December, Draco had never been so furious. The girl's arrogance was absolutely astounding! She'd waltzed across the dance floor gracefully on the arm of one of the most eligible bachelors in the wizarding world, looking more beautiful than a Mudblood had a right to be. Her noxiously colored blue-purple dress fit her too snugly, showing off her hideously undersized breasts and her grossly oversized hips all too well. At least her normally disordered, frizzy hair was tamed, and her bucked teeth fixed right. Thank Merlin for small favors; Draco didn't think he'd be able to tolerate her appearing at such a formal occasion looking as she normally did around school. Still, her air of self-importance made him want to knock the coif right off her head with a well-timed slap. However, with the burly Krum hovering by her side almost endlessly in a jealous worry that whole evening, Draco knew he wouldn't be able to get in any alone time to take the shot. So, he spent the night – as much as he'd been able to stomach, before leaving off with his Slytherin housemates to go get drunk on some bootleg Firewhiskey and snog out with Pansy – brooding, wondering when he'd really be able to get his chance to get even with Granger for the humiliation she'd heaped upon him.

In the middle of Fifth Year, Draco was sure he'd get his shot then. As Umbridge's Inquisitorial Captain, he'd gone out of his way to try to expose Granger's little coup d'état, but in the end, she'd once more made him out the fool and his chance escaped when Umbridge was canned and his father imprisoned in Azkaban for what she and her foul troupe of "goody-goody" friends had done at the Ministry. He'd vowed _serious_ revenge then.

But being initiated under Voldemort and taking the Dark Mark that summer hadn't given him what he'd expected. Instead, by the end of Sixth Year, it had put him into a life-or-death situation that taught him only one thing about himself: deep down inside, Draco Malfoy was a coward. And he loathed himself for that truth.

After that revelation, he became unhinged, a shadow of his former self, cringing in terror at the reality of his choices. He lost his will and his way, and time seemed to pass without any meaning as he returned to Hogwarts for his final year and pretended nothing had changed. Months elapsed, and there was no sign of the Mudblood, and Draco had to finally accept that perhaps she'd been pulled out of school by her parents entirely, as so many other students had, because she was Muggle-born and worried about being attacked by Voldemort's lackeys. He assumed he'd probably never see her again, and that thought put him into a deep funk. He'd never get his chance at settling the score between them now.

But during the Easter break, a miracle happened: she appeared at the mansion, captured alongside Potter and his pathetic red-headed sidekick by Greyback. When Draco had seen her, he felt a moment of elation, only to be crushed back down when he'd been required to look her in the eye and betray her. The look she gave him as he peeked between his lashes and noncommittally gave her up caused his heart to shrivel in his chest and blacken. The only small ounce of self-respect he'd taken away that night was that he had tried to curse Greyback as the beast pawed for Hermione after his aunt had finished torturing her. _No man_ got to touch Granger except Draco, and despite his earlier bout of cowardice he'd raised his wand at Fenrir's head and readied the killing curse.

He'd meant to go down fighting for the right to protect her, but then Weaselbee and Potter had charged to the rescue, as usual. In the ensuing fight, Draco had tried to turn his wand on the werewolf again, but Potter's _Stupefy_ spells, fired one after the other, kept him from doing much more than casting back weak hexes in defense... And then he'd been forced to pick up the wands of his defeated foes because Bellatrix's knife was at Granger's throat, and Draco had been terrified that his crazy aunt would really slit her open from ear to ear if he disobeyed. When the chandelier broke and the shards whipped past him, cutting his face, Draco had fallen back a few steps and covered himself in defense, which had allowed the ever-heroic Potter his chance to take back their wands.

Draco vaguely remembered what happened next: his mother pulled him away, and Potter and the house elf and the goblin apparated out, followed closely by Granger and her boy-toy, and all Draco could do was stare at the spot she'd disappeared from and feel immense relief, followed closely by terror. Voldemort had been summoned by Bella, and now, they'd all pay the price for letting Potter and his friends escape.

He bled and screamed for his penance, as somehow his mother's sister had whined and pleaded and lied as usual, turning the whole thing around to be somehow Draco's and Greyback's faults. Narcissa and Lucius mediated the best they could, begging for leniency for their son, but in the end, they couldn't save him from the longest minute of his life under the claws of the Cruciatus curse first, and then a hex to further flay open the wounds on his body (causing them to bleed profusely all over his family's Aubusson carpet). Afterwards, when Voldemort had slithered away to go deal with the werewolf, commanding his parents to do nothing to aid him as a parting shot, Draco lay on the floor, panting, all his nerve endings viciously seared from the inside out and his face stinging like a hundred razor cuts, and he punished himself for having informed on Granger to begin with. If he had only denied her identification in the beginning, this never would have happened. But he'd been a chicken shite, so he deserved to hurt now. He was a spineless craven of a man.

And just before he blacked out, Draco gave himself a final 'fuck you': Granger had stood up under _Crucio_ for at least two minutes. That was no less than sixty seconds longer than he had been able to hack.

At the Battle of Hogwarts, he'd gotten back into the castle and looked for Hermione high and low, but then he'd run into Crabbe and Goyle in the hallways, and after hearing Voldemort's voice echo its disembodied ultimatum, the three decided to book it to a safer and quieter place to avoid the inevitable blood bath to come. They stationed themselves on the Seventh Floor corridor near the Room of Requirement under Disillusionment Charms to stay out of trouble, hoping no one would chance across them.

But like a bad case of the pox, Granger, Potter and the Weasel popped up unexpectedly. 'The Golden Trio' came looking for Rowena Ravenclaw's diadem in the Room of Hidden Things, according to Potter, who had let his friends in on his plans openly, not knowing that anyone was nearby to hear. It was then that Crabbe bullied Draco into opening the room and going after the troika (as he'd had experience getting in to the Room of Hidden Things all of Sixth Year), so that they could collect Potter and turn him over to the Dark Lord. Draco didn't care one whit about his master's revenge, and most especially not about trying to look good to the wacked out nutter. He went into that room for two reasons only: first, Potter had his wand and he wanted it back, and second, Granger was in danger of being hexed by either Crabbe or Goyle, or both, when she came out and he wanted a chance to warn her, maybe even petrify her and pull her out of sight so she would be safe.

After they'd confronted Scarhead, Draco made several excuses as to why Crabbe couldn't wreck the room, but only because he'd heard Granger scream when stacked items tumbled down atop her (caused by Crabbe's clumsy spell casting). He'd tried to save his friends from the inevitable confrontation, but Crabbe was thick-witted and eager to bully around, and his Fiendfyre spell had gone totally out of control.

The magical flame seared everything in sight as it came roaring down the aisle at them, and he'd quickly lost sight of Crabbe somewhere in the race for the way out. Faster than anticipated, the fire jumped ahead of him, and then Goyle was unconscious, and Draco was stuck dragging his friend's much larger body up to a higher vantage point, needing to see which blasted way he was going. At the same time as spying for the exit (which he was effectively cut off from, he'd just noticed, gods damn it all!), he'd hoped to catch sight of those damnable curly locks, praying Granger was at least heading for safety, too.

Suddenly, Potter swept down towards him on a beat-up, old broom, his hand held out for Draco to take, and he did so without thought, desperate to save his and Goyle's sorry hides, even if it meant throwing himself upon the mercy of his greatest rival.

As if that weren't bad enough, that idiot Weasley dove into danger as well, Hermione on the back of his broom, her arms tight around Carrot Top's waist, and together they heaved Goyle up onto their ride. The five of them headed for the door as fast as the archaic brooms could move. After the ride of his life, with Potter attempting to reach for the diadem and putting them in danger before finally soaring to safety, Draco lay on the floor in the corridor outside gasping for fresh air and calling out for his lost friend, tears in his eyes. His lungs burned with every inhalation, and he felt dizzy and nauseated. He'd been hit on the head rather hard by a _very_ heavy metal sextant, which had toppled over onto him from a shelf as he'd been climbing to higher ground with Goyle's inert body, and now he was wondering if he hadn't given himself a concussion. He crawled to Greg's side to check on him, and seeing his friend was simply unconscious and not dead, he allowed himself a minute or two to black out.

When he came around some time later, Granger was gone. He knew she'd most likely thrown herself back into the thick of things, that stubborn Gryffindor courage egging her on. Draco sighed, knowing what he'd have to do next. By some miracle, he got his feet under him, despite being bone weary, extremely bruised, sick to his stomach, and feeling like his lungs had been put through a cheese grater, and he moved off unsteadily to try to find her, to stop her from making a stupid, unalterable mistake.

On the upper landing of the marble stairwell, near the Entrance Hall, he was stopped by a newly recruited Death Eater with a trained wand. All Draco could do was curse his luck and then play the cards he'd been handed; he'd tried to bluff Voldemort's follower into believing he was on his side still, in the hopes the man would recognize his name and let him pass. All that mattered was reaching Granger.

Wanking Potter saved him yet again, knocking out the black-cowled bad guy. Then Ginger-Bread Boy had punched Draco out for his mistaken understanding of the situation. Lying on the ground, tasting the coppery acid of blood inside his mouth, Draco prepared to toss out a rather scathing retort, only to be stopped in astonishment at seeing Granger's poufy hair peeking out of thin air next to Ronald Fucking Weasley. She was obviously under Potter's invisibility cloak with her friends, safe for the moment.

Draco made to stand, to tell Potter he'd switched sides, but the war erupted again all around – above and below – and old Scarhead and the tag-alongs were gone once more before he could even register what had happened. By the time he'd gotten his feet back under him and looked down, Acromantulas were climbing everywhere, crawling through the massive front doors on their disgusting, spindly legs. There were screams from both Death Eaters and those fighting on the other side, and any being with half a brain fled in primal terror before the ancient predators. Flashes of spells of every color lit up the room brilliantly and almost blindingly, and then that great oaf, Hagrid, was in the middle of the fray, trying to save his nasty-assed pets and was instead carried off by them, hollering for help, undulating on a wavy carpet of black, hairy, crawly ickiness that Draco was sure the visual of would leave him with nightmares for the rest of his life.

At the same time, a giant decided that precise moment would be good for smashing its way through the windows and then its arm pulled back and there came a roaring sound outside the front entrance and the earth shook as two gargantuans took the field against each other.

And that's when the fun _really_ started.

At least a hundred Dementors approached in a wave, their doom and gloom infectious on the very air all the way deep inside the castle, and Draco suddenly felt his legs give out along with his will. He literally collapsed onto his bum rather hard and felt an overwhelming urge to turn his wand on himself. His mind then began a pessimistic journey through deep, meaningful, soul searching deliberation...

He was a scum-sucking Death Eater to the core, wasn't he? He even had the mark to prove it. Further, his pusillanimous father was of the same ilk. Hell, even his grandfathers on both sides had pledged loyalty to Voldemort's cause before their deaths. His family members were _all _unscrupulous, merciless, shameless practitioners of Dark Magic. They were slimy, backstabbing, no good Judas hacks. There wasn't a single noble, honest, or genuine bone in any of them. So, given all that, he wondered why in the hell he was even bothering to try to impress a girl who was so totally the opposite? Granger was completely out of his league...

And that's when it hit him - he was in love with the Mudblood.

Years later, Draco would recall his exact words at that revelation, remembering how the expletives rolled off his tongue easily and with an almost rhyming sense of pleasantness:

_"Holy motherfucking, bloody arsed hell."_

The feeling that suddenly sparkled in his chest – an immense relief comingled with a spreading delightful wonder - was enough of a happy thought that he could cast actually his Patronus rather easily, as Snape had shown him this year in secret to protect him from the possibility of Dementors turning on the Dark Lord in the end. With a wave of his borrowed wand and speaking the words for summoning, a misty, white King Cobra roared forth from the tip of his wand and whisked away through the smashed front doors of the castle to attack the dark cloaked threat that was approaching. He assumed others had been successful at their own Patronus castings as well, as the freezing depression suddenly retreated.

The release of so powerful an advanced magic had taken a lot out of Draco – especially since the spell had formed itself out of his very desperation to save the girl he… _gulp_… loved - and he collapsed backwards, lying flat to ease a wave of dizziness, staring up at the far above ceiling of the moving staircase tower, praying a giant spider didn't find him. His vision fuzzed on the edges and then blackness rolled over him once more.

He woke up to the sound of groans, Professor McGonagall ordering people about, and quickly moving footfalls. He had absolutely no idea how long he'd been unconscious, nor the extent of his wounds, but his only thought was of needing to find Granger, so he sat up woozily, gripping his head between his hands and after a few seconds to wait out the spots that appeared before his eyes, he got to his knees, albeit a bit wobbly.

A familiar female voice reproached him for attempting to stand before Madam Pomfrey had had an opportunity to check him out, and when Draco had opened his eyes, it was to find Daphne Greengrass – the beauty queen of Slytherin - kneeling near him, a wet cloth in her hand, blood under her nails, her left cheek smudged with soot, and her long, blonde hair in total disarray. She attempted to persuade him to sit still, but he shrugged her off and made to stand, only to fall back again as a cold spike smacked into the back of his cranium. Instantly, two pairs of soft, feminine hands cradled him back to the ground, where he lay back, dazed and confused, wondering if he'd cracked his fool skull open.

The new voice that chided him was completely unfamiliar, and as he squinted up to see who it belonged to, for a second, he thought he was looking at a younger, more pixie-like version of Daphne. It turned out that he was, in fact, having that exact experience; Daphne's younger sister, Astoria (as she introduced herself), looked a hell of a lot like her big sis, and it was clear she was going to bloom into someone just as stunning once she grew out of her tomboy stage. The Fifth Year tended to him as Daphne made her way over to find the Medi-Witch, blushing each time she spoke in a soft, melodious voice and refusing to meet his eye. Even in his current state, Draco knew the signs of attraction; Astoria was clearly too inexperienced to disguise her interest. Ordinarily, he would have been flattered and maybe even flirted a little, but at that particular moment, all Draco could think of was a pair of brown-gold eyes and a curly mop of hair, and he wondered if Granger was okay.

Deciding to risk censure, he questioned Astoria on the whereabouts or status of "Potter and his two friends." The young girl let him know that no one knew where Potter was at that moment; he seemed to have disappeared. As for Granger and the red-headed clod… they were in a side classroom on the ground floor mourning over the body of one of the older Weasley males, who had fallen in battle (Astoria could not tell him the name, however, for she did not know it). After twenty or so uncomfortable minutes with the younger Greengrass fawning all over him, Madam Pomfrey finally arrived at his side, did an examination and waved her wand over his head. She told him she'd magically stitched up a cut on the back of his head and cleaned up his bloodied hair, and then gave him a small vial that contained a nasty-flavored restorative from a pouch around her waist. He took the philter in one long pull, grimaced as it slid off his palate and down his throat, and almost instantly felt better. Pomfrey moved on with Daphne and Astoria, leaving Draco to his own.

He sat up, and happily discovering that he was not plagued with a headache, lightheadedness, or nausea any longer, to notice he was in the Great Hall. Apparently, someone had found him on the upper landing and brought him down, although he had no recollection of who that might have been or when. He pushed to his feet and headed out into the castle proper again, looking for Granger.

In an East Wing classroom, there she was, standing off to the side crying, as Weaselbee and his family huddled around the motionless body of one of the twins. Spying on her through the crack in the door, Draco longed to go to her, to comfort her, but he knew he would be unwelcome in a rather violent way, and so he watched her silently, until someone approached down the corridor and he scampered off quickly, so as not to be caught gawking like the lovesick fool he was.

Sighing in relief that she was at least safe for now, and with a bunch of powerful wizards to protect her, Draco made his way back up to the Room of Hidden Things, wanting to see what remained of Crabbe, if anything.

The uncontrolled Fiendfyre was completely out now. The place was a charred mess and the air reeked of an assortment of noxious chemical odors comingled with the revolting scent of crisped flesh. After minutes of walking about over half-singed, collapsed piles of furniture, tomes, cauldrons, and other oddities, he found Crabbe's partially melted skeleton lying under a bowed shelf. He briefly wondered if his friend had either tried hiding under it before being hit by his own spell, or if the bookshelf had pinned him and made it impossible for him to run from the fire, or if the shelf had simply fallen on Crabbe after he was already dead. Regardless, tears streamed down his face as he struggled to and then succeeded in moving the wooden barrier off his friend's scorched, steaming remains. Try as he might, though, he could not make himself actually touch the bones to move them.

He screamed in fright when Crabbe's ghost unexpectedly appeared next to him, and told him not to be sad that he was dead, because it had been his (Vincent's) fault for trying such a stupid, dirty spell to begin with. He then asked if their mate, Goyle, had made it out, and dazedly, Draco told him he had, which caused Crabbe's fat face to split wide open in a relieved grin. Draco then promised he'd make sure Vincent had a nice funeral, and that he'd be buried next to his mum, who had died when he was still a child, and this seemed to be the relief Crabbe needed to pass over to the other side. With a last, winsome smirk plastered to his mutt face, and in a flash of blinding white light, Crabbe disappeared and Draco never saw him again (he wasn't ever reported as being among the resident ghosts at Hogwarts either).

Draco took a last look around at the terrible mess – piles of ash, burnt furniture, glass vials crashed onto the floor with their liquid contents oozing together, and the Vanishing Cabinet lying on its face, one of its sides burned clean through, rendering it permanently inert, and then headed for the door. As he turned the row to head towards the exit, he stumbled across a pile of books that had spilled out onto the floor and nearly fell flat on his face. One of the books, he noted, was an old Advanced Potion Making text. He absently picked it up, amused that something so benign would be in a place like the Room of Hidden Things, and flipped to the front cover's inscription:

_"This book is the property of The Half-Blood Prince"_

Draco wondered who such an arrogant cock-wanker was to call himself a 'Prince,' but as he flipped through the first few pages, he noticed the clever annotations in the margins and thought he just might keep the book for its helpful hints. Thumbing through it to the very end, his eye caught a very specific word, and he froze up:

_Sectumsempra_

Draco knew that one well. It was the Dark Curse Potter had hurled at him that afternoon in the boy's bathroom during Sixth Year that had nearly killed him. Was this text how the Boy Wonder had learned such a deadly spell, then?

He was definitely keeping the book now.

Tucking it into the waist of his pants in the back, for that was the only place he could safely put it for now, he made his way to the door and on a whim, looked back one more time. The room was toast, and whatever wonders and secrets it had once held were now mostly gone. Personally, he had no intention of ever coming back here; he'd tell the staff where to find Crabbe's body and then he'd make sure it was interred correctly, but he, himself, would never step foot in this room ever again. The Room of Hidden Things – and his past connection to it – could now be laid to rest.

He made his way back towards the Great Hall, only to hear a tremendous ruckus, indicating that the fighting was back on. Draco hurried to the classroom where he'd last seen Hermione, but no one was there except the dead Weasley boy's body. Panicked, he rushed about trying to see a glimpse of her crazy, curly head, even heading out into the front entrance into the fray, dodging rogue spells, wayward arrows (from Centaurs, who had apparently come from out of the Forbidden Forest to battle against Voldemort), bumbling giants (whose massive bodies flailed about as they fought and fell before wizard's magic and each other), and he even once dodged the broken body of a Thestral (which apparently he could now see, since he'd witnessed so many murders and deaths over the last year) as it fell from the sky to land in a crumpled heap on the front lawn. Still, there was no sign of Granger, or of his parents.

Now the fight was being pushed back into Hogwarts proper once more, the Hogwarts wizards and their allies retreating step by step in what looked to be a "last stand" assembly. Draco passed back through the smashed doors (was actually pressed into them) just as a gaggle of tiny house elves, each bearing wicked sharp knives in their small hands, ran past with a united battle cry, throwing themselves into the fight in an effort to save their home. As he watched with horrified amazement, well trained, powerful Death Eaters fell brutally under the stabbing motions of simple, ordinary kitchen utensils, and for the first time in his life, Draco appreciated the hired help. He was also quite sure that the vision of bug-eyed, long-eared munchkins covered with blood and screaming for more was going to visit him in his nightmares as well.

He skittered through the entrance and into the Great Hall to witness sheer pandemonium, Voldemort at the center of it all.

And there were his parents! He called to them, and they met him outside the former dining area, his mother pushing him against the stone wall, out of harm's way, his father using his bigger body to shield them both. He hugged them, so fucking happy just to see them alive that he felt tears prickle his eyes. He told them of Crabbe's death and Potter's destruction of the diadem, and in return, they told him of Potter's faked death and their betrayal of the Dark Lord for his sake. Terror such as he'd never known suddenly gripped him tightly around the heart; if Voldemort won today, he would reap his vengeance upon them for their treachery.

He did the unthinkable then: he prayed Potter would succeed.

Just then, he spied Daphne Greengrass carrying her injured sister out of the Great Hall, and he pushed past his parents to help her get Astoria to the girl's bathroom down the hall. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out his embossed handkerchief, wet it in one of the sinks, and carefully wiped the blood from the littlest Greengrass' face, then palmed the cloth to Daphne with a warning to stay hidden and quiet, and a wish of good luck. He returned to the hall to his parents, who had moved further away from the action, huddling in a dark alcove in the corridor. Wandless as they were, he warned them to stay silent and hidden, told them of the two secret ways out of the castle that he knew, and made them swear that if Potter lost, they would hi-tail it out of England to their family's chateaux in France where he would try to meet up with them later, and then he shoved past – despite their cries for him not to go – and went in search of Granger. She would be, he knew, in the heart of the battle.

He got back to the Great Hall just in time to see the Death Eaters being defeated one by one by the desperate resistence members, and then his Aunt Bellatrix fell to Molly Weasley and his former master screamed in rage and frustration. Draco smirked in dark pleasure at the sound. If nothing else came from today, at least he had the satisfaction of hearing that bastard hurt.

Potter stepped out from under his invisibility cloak at just the right moment, as usual, making a grand entrance. Everyone left standing let out a gasp of surprise. Draco moved along the far wall, closest to where Slytherin's table usually was situated, and tried to listen to the Dark Lord and his arch-nemesis bait each other before they got down to business.

When Draco learned of Snape's duplicity and the reasons for it from Potter's own mouth, shame embraced him and tears fell down his cheeks unabashedly. His godfather had been an honest man all along. He'd suffered silent and alone for years, always on the outside, never trusted or respected by the majority of his colleagues and the students because of his faux allegiance to the Dark Lord, and he'd heaped a lifetime of sins – lies and murder - upon his weary shoulders all in an effort to protect the world from Voldemort. The profound regret of a debt left unpaid between he and Snape lingered in his heart, and Draco vowed that if he survived the war, he'd assure Severus' tombstone was grand and his epitaph described his unswerving heroism. The world should know the truth: that a great man had sacrificed everything for the sake of the one he'd loved.

The goading continued. Potter was relentless, much to the approval of the gathered crowd.

When it was revealed, rather loudly, that he - Draco Malfoy - had been the true master of the Elder Wand, but that he'd lost that right when Potter had disarmed him (in the duel that afternoon at the Manor House), Draco felt a flush of cold run through his entire system. He'd been holding onto the most powerful piece of wizarding magic in the world, and he hadn't even known it. If he _had_ retained his mastery over the wand that day, if Potter hadn't gotten in that propitious "_Expelliarmus_," he, Draco, would have been murdered under Nagini's fangs instead.

He'd dodged death so many times now that he wondered (watching Potter, and with much trepidation), if his luck was just about up…

And then the moment arrived, and in fact, the Elder Wand _did_ recognize Potter as its true master, and Voldemort fell backwards with an awful finality, his arms thrown out wide, as if embracing death, killed by his own curse.

For a few seconds, Draco thought the ending somewhat anti-climactic, almost predictable. But then he realized that the Dark Lord was well and truly gone _forever_, and a palpable relief caused him to sag against the stone wall, clutching his fast-pounding heart. The cheers all around were deafening.

Sensing her presence nearby, almost uncannily, Draco looked up just in time to see Hermione throw herself into Potter's embrace, hugging him enthusiastically with relief and joy, her smile bright enough to light up the whole room.

It hurt… to see that look on her face, because Draco knew, unequivocally that Granger would never look at him that way. And in that second, he realized the awful truth: he and she could never be friends, especially after everything that had gone down between them over the last seven years. Sometimes, one's past catches up to them - as Potter had so elegantly pointed out to the Dark Lord. Besides, Hermione Granger lived in a completely different world from Draco Malfoy. His future, if indeed he had one after the Wizengamot was through with him, would be filled with dishonest and corrupt political maneuvering, and a necessary, loveless alliance between himself and a Pureblood witch of good stock and standing to secure his family's name and fortunes. Granger's world was one of sunshine and lollipops and rainbows and freedom. That was where she belonged, and that was where he would let her stay.

Numbly, Draco made his way back into the Entrance Hall, where his parents instantly rushed to his side. As they sat together, huddled on the stairs, he told them of the final duel in a bloodless, dispassionate voice. He bet they assumed it was because he was upset that their master had been killed, but the truth was that Draco felt as if _he'd_ been the one defeated in that room just now. And ironically, he had been. Like Snape, he'd been conquered by an unrequited love for a girl.

Exhausted, Draco laid his head on his father's shoulder and promptly fell asleep.

He awoke an hour later, lying on the floor, his head pillowed by his father's robes, his parents talking quietly nearby with some Aurors and Kingsley Shacklebolt, the new Minister of Magic, about the events of the night, giving their version of the story. Draco made his way over to them on shaky legs, handing the cape off to his father with a nodded thanks, and he corroborated their tale of working with Snape all along to betray the Dark Lord this last year, since his father's incarceration in Azkaban. It was a blatant lie, of course, but it would be up to the Ministry to prove their story false. Draco felt fairly confident that they _would_ get away with the deception, because he knew several things that worked in their favor. First and foremost, the Wizengamot couldn't legally use Veritaserum in court, as it had been deemed unreliable on those who were Occlumens - which both Lucius and his son were (or so Snape had reassured him after Dumbledore's death). As for Narcissa, there was always the antidote (whose formula he could now easily extract from the pages of his newly acquired Advanced Potions Making book), which could be taken in advance with milk to coat one's stomach against the effects of truth serum. His Legilimens father could also simply plant false memories into his wife's mind which could be Obliviated later, if need be. In any case, Draco was reasonably certain that his parents knew all of this as well as he did, and they'd taken into account that lying was their only, best option for avoiding incarceration or a Dementor's Kiss.

After finishing their bogus tale, Shacklebolt politely, but firmly stated that Aurors would be assigned to shadow the Malfoy family until a full investigation could be conducted. In the meantime, he allowed them to go into the Great Hall to partake of the meal that was going to be served within the hour, after the house tables were returned to their original spots and the elves in the kitchen stopped celebrating long enough to start preparing the food.

His family inched their way into the room of celebrants as inconspicuous as possible and picked a spot in the topmost corner nearest the doors, to stand idly by and wait quietly until the wooden benches had been set down again in their neat rows. Draco took his place in the middle of his mother and father, and then when they were all three settled, he reached out and gripped his parents' hands, one in each of his. Many things had changed over the course of the last day and night, not the least of which were his feelings – everything from the importance of blood purity to friendships to a girl with curly hair who now dominated his every thought. Perhaps, then, it was true then what they said: that love really was the miracle for all change, great and small.

Sunlight began streaming through the shattered windows far above, and without the magicked ceiling, it flooded the room with light and life. Unwittingly, Draco's eyes sought out Granger; she was clustered near the family of red-headed wizards at the far end of the room, standing on the outside of their circle once more, giving comfort to her friend - boyfriend, apparently now (as evident by the way she kissed his lips tentatively when he turned to her at one point) - and his family as she was allowed.

Burning jealousy took hold in Draco's gut. Why she'd pick Weasley to shower her affections upon, of all the men around, he just couldn't fathom. The guy had the intelligence of a fish, and the skill and grace of an ox. What Granger needed was someone more her equal – a polished man of innate magical talent, with elegance and style, who could provide intellectually stimulating debate, and who could shower her with the world's finest things... Draco was starting to feel as if he just might be up to that task in the near future, despite everything, an inkling of his old, peacock-strutting self peeking out once more from behind the sinister shade of who he had become under Voldemort's reign of terror.

If he gave it some time, he was betting he could make Hermione forget all about the fact that she despised him. After all, there was a fine line between love and hate, as Draco knew oh, so well now. Yeah, he just might be able to pull it off…

He watched Granger intently, bemusedly, as a new age dawned upon the wizarding world, making silent, internal plans of his own for change.

~FIN~


End file.
